29-year-old Aaron Flynn was last seen leaving an address on Keilambete
Road on Friday 11 November 2016 in a black Volvo Station Wagon with
Queensland registration 588 HBL. On 17 November 2016 this vehicle was
located near Rubyvale QLD however Aaron has not been seen or made contact
anyone since. Police hold concerns as his behaviour is out of character.

THE family of a Sunshine Coast father of one who vanished without a
trace have been desperately combing central Queensland looking for
him after police called off the official search.

Aaron Flynn, 29, of Caloundra was last heard from on Friday, November
11, when he sent his two-year-old daughter a text goodnight as he made
his way to Charters Towers for a family funeral.

He was spotted the next day walking along the road from Rubyvale with a
jerry can in his hand.

But despite an extensive police, SES and community search, he’s not been
seen.

Police called off the search, saying expert advice was Mr Flynn could
not have survived that long in the bush with little water and
temperatures topping 40C.

But Mr Flynn’s sister Renee Napthali and other family members hired a
helicopter to continue the search. Today they were searching between
Charters Towers, Capell, Rubyvale and further east, and drove from town
to town putting up missing posters and appealing for information to find
the missing dad.

Inspector Dave Peff today appealed for anyone with information to come
forward, and said officers were continuing an “electronic” search for Mr
Flynn including bank accounts and other movements, though the
search-and-rescue mission had ended.

He said police hoped Mr Flynn had been picked up by someone as he walked
along the road away from his car, a Volvo, found on November 18.

“The reason we stopped that search was based on survivability,” Insp
Peff said.

“A person leaving that position on foot, given the heat and the amount
of water, it’s believed from expert advice it wasn’t survivable.”

He said Mr Flynn was last seen walking along the road beyond Rubyvale
carrying a jerry can on November 12.

Mrs Napthali said the family had been upset when the official search was
called off, but a day scouring the arid country from the air had failed
to find even a trace of her brother.

She said they were clinging to hope her brother, who had lived in the
area in the past, had been picked up along the road and was not in the
bush.

“We are confident he is not out there — it’s such a vast land,” Mrs
Napthali said.

“We’ve got to hope someone’s picked him up and given him a lift.”

Mrs Napthali said the family had hired a helicopter and checked all
along the roads and waterholes yesterday.

“We got down low, went around all the waterholes and checked all those
for footprints,” she said.

“We’ve done really detailed searches.

“There’s just no traces.”

Mrs Napthali said her brother had recently separated from his partner
but “there’s no way he would leave his little girl”.

Anyone with information can phone Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000 or online

He said there were plenty of questions left unanswered and urged the
public to come forward with any "gem" or "missing piece of the puzzle"
which may help police locate him.

"I want to assure the community and the family that we have not given up
on this, we are following leads and anything that comes up we will
certainly run that out," Insp Peff said.

Aaron was last seen walking with a jerry can along the road on Friday,
November 11, but police were first advised he was missing on Wednesday,
November 16.

That evening, QPS located Aaron's black Volvo station wagon abandoned
and launched the full-scale land and helicopter search of about 50km sq
of "difficult terrain" in hot conditions from Thursday, November 17.

"At this time we are exploring the possibility that he's left his
vehicle and walked off from that vehicle," Insp Peff said.

"The difficulty is we don't know in which direction, so it makes it
quite a large area to search.

"What I can say is there's been no contact obviously from him and we
certainly have no other means of ascertaining his whereabouts since he's
left that vehicle."

Yesterday, Aaron's desperate family hired a private helicopter to extend
the search and praised the police and volunteers for their help.

Insp Peff said he absolutely understood the family's actions and
explained police had conducted a systematic search "very much structured
around survivability".

"And structured around the distance that person would reasonably expect
to travel in a known time and then we obviously run in a bit of extra
distance on top of that," Insp Peff said.

"That's been done, but I do absolutely understand the family's
motivation to try and find him and I understand why they're doing what
they are doing.

"The reason we have stopped the physical search was based on
survivability; now I want to be clear that doesn't mean we say that he
hasn't survived, but under the circumstances and the area we were
searching, survivability was determined to be zero.

"So that doesn't mean that he hasn't been picked up by someone or hasn't
managed to get a lift, what it means is a person leaving that position
on foot over that period of time given the heat and the conditions that
existed at the time and the amount of water it's believed from expert
advice that it wasn't survivable."

Search for missing Sunshine Coast dad Aaron Flynn

THE family of missing dad Aaron Flynn have enlisted an Aboriginal
tracker to help them search for the Sunshine Coast man who vanished
without trace in the blistering central Queensland gemfields.

They hope the tracker and 25 SES volunteers, who will tomorrow search a
final parcel of land, will uncover clues to the whereabouts of Mr Flynn,
29, who was last heard from on November 11 when he sent his two-year-old
daughter a text goodnight as he made his way to Charters Towers near
Townsville for a family funeral.

He was spotted the next day walking along the road from Rubyvale with a
jerry can in his hand.

Despite an extensive police, SES and community search, he’s not been
seen since.

Police called off the search, saying expert advice was Mr Flynn could
not have survived the more than a week he’s been missing if he was still
in the bush where there’s little water and temperatures have topped 40C.

Family members hired a helicopter to continue the search for Mr Flynn
but his sister Renee Napthali said they failed to find a trace of him.

Now the family have turned to hiring an Aboriginal tracker and hoping a
final search by the SES of land they could not access will help them
find Mr Flynn.

The family have already wallpapered central Queensland shops and truck
stops with posters appealing for information and spent the last week
checking CCTV along major routes of any clues he had passed that way.

She has also contacted Mt Isa police about using a specially-trained
sniffer dog who can detect dead bodies, but hoped that was a last
resort.

“We need to bring him home,” Mrs Napthali said.

Anyone with information can phone Crimestoppers on 1800 333 000 or at crimestoppers.com.au,
or contact the family through Facebook.

Fundraiser in honour of missing man

by Louise Shannon - CQ News

25th Aug 2017 10:20 AM

NOT quite a year ago, 29-year-old father Aaron Flynn went missing and he has
never been found.

It would have been his 30th birthday this month.

He disappeared on his way to his uncle's funeral after his car, a black Volvo
station wagon, ran out of petrol near Rubyvale as he made the 1300km trip from
Caloundra to Charters Towers.

Heartbreakingly for his friends and family, including his now three-year-old
daughter, very little is known about Aaron's fate.

His wallet, with money still in it, phone and clothes were in the car when it
was found the week after he vanished.

It is believed he left the car, taking his jerry can and Esky to get fuel and
water from Rubyvale, a 10km hike away.

A young mother driving to a swimming carnival with her children saw Aaron
walking along the side of the road about 6.30am on November 12. That was the
last sighting of him.

To mark his birthday and honour her son and his love of fishing, Aaron's mother
has kicked off a fundraising tribute and will donate the money to a cause she
knows he would be enthusiastic about - fishing trips for people with
disabilities.

Roz Flynn this week stoically set up the fundraiser on the Sport and Leisure for
the Handicapped Association Inc. (Caloundra) Facebook page, where people can
make donations.

On her personal Facebook page, she has already gained the support of more than
2000 followers after writing a song for her son and posting a photo gallery of
his life.

"Aaron's greatest passion was fishing and in his memory, with his father Merv
and sister Renée, we are sponsoring Sport and Leisure for the Handicapped,” Mrs
Flynn said.

"I met these two wonderful men who take handicapped people out fishing and it's
hard for them to get sponsorship.

"They get a few volunteers, but mostly it's just the two of them - that's a big
call. They've got a boat but they need a different type of boat to accommodate
wheelchairs.”

Mrs Flynn said she wanted to sponsor the men and their efforts in Aaron's
memory.

"We have asked everybody in Aaron's memory to donate to this fishing group,” she
said.

"We want to try and do something positive. It never will bring him back, but
nothing will and we want to give other people the experience of something that
he loved dearly.”

Mrs Flynn said it had been Missing Persons Week earlier this month, from August
5-11, and it was an ideal time to highlight the importance of the hope and
despair experienced by families and friends of missing people as they searched
for clues about the whereabouts of their loved ones.

She said while she continued to hope, she didn't believe Aaron would be found
alive.

"That's the hardest thing, not having any answers,” Mrs Flynn said.

"It's the worst nightmare any parent could ever imagine.”

By focusing their attention on a good cause, Mrs Flynn wanted Aaron's friends
and family to be able to think of him in a positive way.

"We haven't got a body to bury, we haven't got a grave and we haven't got
closure - we haven't got anything,” she said.

"We need to do something. And we also need to do it for Aaron's daughter.

"We went out fishing on his birthday because that's what he loved to do.

"And we want to see other people less able than us to be able to experience the
joy of fishing. Being out on the water and being able to experience the water is
very healing.”

Immediately after Aaron's car was found in bushland just off the roadway on
Rubyvale Rd on November 17, police and the SES launched an air and land search.

His sister worked with an Aboriginal tracker in rugged bushland at the Gemfields
and the family hired a private helicopter to join the search, but no new leads
have been found.

"We can't have a funeral or memorial,” she said.

"There is nothing we can do but perhaps we can take on this cause in his memory.

"This will be a positive legacy for our son.”

Donations to honour Aaron Flynn can be made to
Sport and Leisure for the Handicapped Assoc. Inc. (Caloundra) via their Facebook
page.